The present invention is concerned with electronic devices including SATA interfaces, which in particular relates to a SATA device with self-test function and method of testing the same.
In the environment of a serial advanced technology attachment (SATA) interface, it conducts an out-of-band (OOB) signaling operation in several cases of power-on sequence modes for establishing smooth communication links and a power saving modes. During such a OOB-signaling scheme, signals are transmitted by means of intervals of on/off periods and the number of burst signals, not directly using signals with physical speed such as 1.5 Gbps, 3 Gbps, or 6 Gbps.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram schematically illustrating a general SATA device with host and device platforms. FIG. 2 is a block diagram illustrating the feature of transceiving control signals at the host and device platforms of the SATA device by the conventional art. Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, the host platform 20 has a host application system 21, a host controller 22, and a SATA analogue circuit 23. The device platform 10 has a device application system 11, a device controller 12, and a SATA analogue circuit 13. The host platform 20 and the device platform 10 are connected to each other through a SATA cable.
A SATA transceiving condition through the OOB-signaling scheme is initialized as follows. The host controller 22 of the host platform 20 sends a control signal COMRESET to the SATA analogue circuit 23. The SATA analogue circuit 23 transmits the control signal COMRESET to the device platform 10 by way of the SATA cable 30 in the form of analogue. The device controller 12 of the device platform 10 confirms the control signal COMRESET that is received through the SATA analogue circuit 13, and then applies a control signal COMINIT to the SATA analogue circuit 13. The SAYA analogue circuit 13 transmits the control signal COMINIT to the host platform 20 by way of the SATA cable 30 in the form of analogue. The host controller 22 of the host platform 20 confirms the control signal COMEINIT received thereto, and then transmits a control signal COMWAKE (hereinafter, referred to as waking signal) to the device platform 10. The device controller 12 of the device platform 10 confirms the control signal COMWAKE, and then transmits the waking signal COMWAKE to the host platform 20. As same as such, after exchanging a primitive signal ALIGN between the device platform 10 and the host platform 20 in order to accord a communication frequency (or data rate) therebetween, the initialization for the SATA transceiving condition is completed by generating each standby signal Phy_Ready.
The control signal COMREST (i.e., reset signal) is always generated from the host platform 20, resetting the device platform 10. The control signal COMINIT (i.e., initializing signal) is generated always from the device platform 10, requesting for initializing a communication condition. The initializing signal COMINIT is the same with the reset signal COMRESET in electrical dimension. The waking signal COMWAKE and the primitive signal ALIGN are all generated from the host platform 20 and the device platform 10.
In testing such an OOB-signaling scheme, it needs to apply burst signals, which are generated by the standard of SATA specification, to a test target, and to determine whether an OOB-signaling operation has been properly completed. Thus, it is required with external test equipment including an analogue circuit (i.e., physical layer) that is able to carry out serial communication with a test target.